1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a stereoscopic display device, and more particularly, to a stereoscopic display device using an electrically-driven liquid crystal lens.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
In general, stereoscopic images representing 3-dimensions are realized based on the principle of stereo-vision via the viewer's eyes. It can be said that disparity of the viewer's eyes, i.e. binocular disparity due to the viewer's eyes being spaced apart from each other by about 65 mm is the most important factor in stereoscopic sensitivity. Specifically, the viewer's left and right eyes view different 2-dimensional images, respectively, and if the two images are transmitted to the brain through the retina, the brain fuses the images, giving the impression of a real 3-dimensional image. This ability is conventionally called stereography, and a stereoscopic display device is obtained by applying stereography to a display device.
At present, of methods realizing the above-described stereoscopic display device, an electrically-driven liquid crystal lens has been proposed, in which a liquid crystal layer serves as a lens based on characteristics of liquid crystal molecules.
FIG. 1 is a configuration view illustrating a conventional stereoscopic display device using an electrically-driven liquid crystal lens.
The conventional stereoscopic display device using an electrically-driven liquid crystal lens, as shown in FIG. 1, includes a display panel 30, and an electrically-driven liquid crystal lens 40 attached to one side of the display panel 30.
The display panel 30 may be selected from all kinds of displays adapted to display 2-dimensional images. The electrically-driven liquid crystal lens 40 includes two electrodes opposite each other with a liquid crystal layer interposed therebetween. Here, note that liquid crystal molecules constituting the liquid crystal layer have a phase distribution similar to that of an actual lens that controls pathways of incident light in response to the intensity and distribution of an electric field.
As a result, if first and second images IM1 and IM2 are emitted from the display panel 30, the images IM1 and IM2 reach the viewer's left and right eyes via operation of the electrically-driven liquid crystal lens 40 that controls pathways of incident light. Specifically, as shown in FIG. 1, the viewer's right eye views the first image IM1 via light having passed through first image pixels P1 of the display panel 30, and the viewer's left eye views the second image IM2 via light having passed through second image pixels P2 of the display panel 30. As the viewer's right and left eyes view the first and second images IM1 and IM2 corresponding to the different pixels, respectively, the viewer can perceive stereoscopic images.
Recently, to satisfy various consumer desires, there is a need for development of a novel stereoscopic display device capable of facilitating inter-conversion between 3-dimensional images and 2-dimensional images while enabling switching between a wide viewing angle and a narrow viewing angle.